Though we are faithless, He is faithful.
Though we change, He never will.

Monday, August 29

i'm not going to die today.

But if i did, it would be of happiness, with a heart overfull.

I don't have many possessions that would be of much worth to someone who is not me, but just to be clear, Melody Sheppard should have all my clothes, and my books should be added to my parent's library. Mom, you could take some photography classes so you could use my camera.

today would be a decent day to die.

Today is the last day of my Twenty-First year. (and did you know your cells begin to die faster than they are created at the age of twenty-two? so really, either way, tomorrow i'll be deteriorating. nice knowing you all.)

I have discovered so much about myself and about others, learned valuable lessons that improved the quality of my emotional life, become more artistic and more articulate, traveled the United States, lost self pity, and found confidence. I am more well-humored than I have ever been, and more well-rounded. I like risks. I like people. I like style. I like reading.

My church even called today about India support - with news they said i'd like to hear.

In celebration of personal growth, and in culmination & conclusion of a fantastic year, I'm skydiving today.

Thursday, August 11

So, Norma is a woman who suffers from compounded paranoid-schizophrenia and dementia who lives on the behavior hall. The doors are locked for resident safety, and today she wanted to go home. She was exit-seeking all day, and though she always mumbles, she was so flustered today that her speech was nearly indecipherable. Towards the end of the day, though, she approached me in the dining room, looked me directly in the eyes and asked with stunning clarity, "Do you know how to leave?" When a person has dementia, you enter the world in which their mind has entangled them instead of trying to bring them back; reality only confuses and upsets them. With this in mind I automatically replied "No, Norma. I only know how to stay."

Even as the words danced in smiling and comforting deceit out of my mouth, the irony of speaking them to her on my last day with her stung my lips.

I do know how to leave... i know very well how. I constantly and perpetually leave; it seems more now a force of habit or a way of life than anything else. For me, to leave is to stay - to change is to continue in the same way.

The question is not "Do i know how to leave", but instead, "Do i know how to stay?"

I haven't kept a job for more than six months in over four years. I have had nearly every different hairstyle and color i can think of. I have traveled to ten of the fifty states in the last three months. I have moved five times since January, and plan to soon live across an ocean. Have i ever learned how to stay? I can see where the value of staying would be immense - this nostalgia and homesickness for more than one place is overwhelming... not to mention the promotions that can be had if you continue to work with the same employer.

all of that aside, though. When i get very caught up in leaving, i have an aching desire to find a place that draws me so strongly downward that all i can do is stay. Who knows, maybe i'll never be that type of person, and i'll have to learn the disjointed contentment of the uprooted, the stationary heart on the shuffling feet of the nomad. Maybe what i long for is so otherworldly that it can't be found in a windowseat and a basement. Maybe i should let an evolving settledness replace the way that i feel tonight.

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I hope you enjoy reading a little about my life, my passions, and the highlights of my world travels! My heart is in Delhi, but it packs up to follow me wherever my feet occasionally wander. This page is more of a journaling effort than anything, but if you want to follow my story as it unfolds, keep checking back; I promise you'll see some exciting stuff.